The present invention generally relates to account payment systems and methods. More particularly, the present invention relates to systems and methods that allow a provider, such as an independent third party bill payment service provider or a billing party, to deliver account payment information to a wireless communication device user, preferably to a cell phone user.
Millions of households need to spend a significant amount of time and energy each month to respond to numerous account or bill payments. Such account payments may include utility bills (e.g., cell phone, telephone, water, electricity, gas, garbage, cable), credit card bills, loan payment bills (e.g., home mortgage payments, car loan payments, student loan payments, commercial business loan payments), insurance payments, tax bill payments (e.g., property tax, personal income tax, business tax), merchant bills, bank bills, etc.
The most common method of account payment is mail delivery of a paper bill or coupon book by a billing party to a bill payer. The bill payer in return writes a paper check for the appropriate amount and mails the check along with the associated account payment coupon to the billing party. This method is labor intensive and time consuming for the bill payer. Moreover, account payments must be done on multiple occasions each month since bills do not normally arrive or become due on the same date. In addition, the bill-payer has to absorb the cost of postage in mailing the paper checks to the billing parties. In short, the bill payer is required to inconveniently go through multiple steps for account payment, including manually receiving each bill, keeping track of account payments for a variety of bills depending on when they arrive or become due, and manually paying each bill as well as absorbing postage costs. Further, mail delivery of a bill may be problematic in certain circumstances. For example, the bill payer may misplace, lose, or never receive a mailed account payment notification or be away from home on a business trip or vacation, without receiving a bill in the mail, resulting in the bill being unpaid and possibly becoming overdue. Overdue bills may in turn result in finance charges being assessed to the bill payer and/or cause other inconveniences, such as, the trouble of getting canceled or terminated services reinstated.
With respect to the billing party, the cost for preparing and mailing a paper bill may be a significant per unit cost. These costs include the paper for the bill, any enclosures, the envelope, postage, printing, data management, etc. Paper check processing also entails significant costs to the billing parties who receive and handle remittances in this manner. Billing parties have a large incentive to try to reduce this high cost associated with mailing account payment statements. Furthermore, receipt of a paper bill in the mail does not necessarily encourage the bill payer to reply using more cost effective and efficient bill payment methods preferred by the billing party, such as telephone bill paying or electronic bill payment methods, which are described in more detail below.
Attempts have been made to improve the efficiency of account payment methods. One such method involves payment of bills though electronic bill payment systems, such as PayPal, CheckFree, C2it by Citibank, Visa ePay, Quicken, MS Money, etc., that are directly operated by the billing party or an independent third party payment service provider. For example, bill delivery and payment is transacted over a communication network such as the well-known internet network or the world wide web thereof. The bill payer typically uses a personal computer to access or login in on a web site provided by a server computer to view bill information and instruct the server computer to make bill payments accordingly. Optionally, without visiting a web site, a bill payer may be provided with electronic bills in the form of electronic mail (e-mail) at his/her e-mail address. After opening an electronic bill by accessing or logging into an e-mail site, a bill payer may make the bill payment by replying to the electronic bill or by accessing a web site to secure electronic payment.
Although such electronic means over the internet (via accessing or logging into a web site or e-mail site) for account payment takes advantage of the advanced personal computer and internet communication technologies, such electronic means often is not a viable option to bill payers who may have limited or no access to the internet to carry out such electronic banking services. For example, business or leisure travelers who are often on the road or employees at off-site work locations typically have limited or no access to the internet or e-mail sites to receive any bill payment notification or transmit any bill payments. Moreover, internet or e-mail account payment services often fail to provide instantaneous, real-time notification to a bill payer and are not always conveniently accessible at all locations (e.g., when driving or taking public transportation, no household/work internet access, etc.).
Other alternatives that have been proposed are pre-authorizations from a bill payer to a billing party or third party payment service that automatically deduct a bill payment from a bill payer account each month (i.e., recurring electronic funds transfer (REFT) from a checking or savings account or having a credit card charged automatically). This type of account payment method suffers from a lack of bill payer control as the bill payer no longer has the choice of not to pay the bill. For example, if the bill payer wants to dispute a charge on the bill, it is often very difficult to, short of closing the account, to prevent the billing party from taking a disputed amount from the bill payer's account due to the pre-authorization. Moreover, typically such pre-authorizations require that the bill payer use a specific funding account, in turn making it difficult for the bill payer to change the funding account at the time of payment as bill payment is automatically processed without input from the bill payer. It has further been suggested to use telephone systems, such as TelPay, for handling bill payments. Such systems typically incorporate voice response technology that allows a bill payer to make a one-time electronic funds transfer (EFT) payment from a checking or savings or a one-time credit card payment. However, to date, such systems are limited in that they rely on the bill payer to initiate the bill-paying process by calling the telephone bill paying system first after receiving a bill, typically in the mail, and providing the telephone system with information on the bills to be paid.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for alternate methods and systems that facilitate efficient account payment whereby a bill payer may conveniently and reliably receive bill delivery from any location and optionally, at the same time or a later time, effectively make the bill payment by taking full advantage of advanced wireless communication technologies. Such an improved account payment system may further leverage existing systems, such as an existing telephone bill paying system. These and other shortcomings in the prior art are addressed in the present invention.